This has been a general rant and is not specifically directed at any of your games since I haven't played them.

It's good that you added this line.I had a strong and developed story to tell in Laxius Force III, so I do believe it's not length for length. It has fast battles, fast walking speed, visible enemies in the majority of the areas and a lot of different places to visit.You do get plenty of fighting, but plenty of story as well.

In terms of rating the RPGM games, it's been a bit of learning process for all of us. Learning what the engine is capable of and even trying to come up with standards for submission on the fly. I'll admit that maybe some of my scores might have been high at first, but that's the human factor of the honeymoon period. Plus, it's difficult weighing out rating games based on how good they are for RPGM games or rating them compared to everything else. Basically, balancing the apples-to-apples comparo with the apples-to-grapes (since it's all fruit) comparisons.

And lately, I've actually rated some RPGM games fairly harshly lately because they brought nothing to the table and/or just weren't very good. I tend to obey my gut feeling after playing a game when thinking about my scores. Even if a game is objectively sound, did I enjoy it? And something like Dawn's Light was a lot more enjoyable to me than another game with bigger budget production values.

As far as Laxius goes, it's an acquired taste and though it's not my preferred RPG (Millennium is my favorite Aldorlea game), I give it props for ambition and my gut feeling after playing it.

First off, I never played the original Laxius Power games, but I can certainly vouch for Laxius Force; if you can get pest the generic RMXP stock graphics and music, (though there are still some original graphics used,) the're really pretty enjoyable games. However, back when I played them, I certainly had more time on my hands, and was able to spend a good chunk of time on them; not counting the sidequests, the dang trilogy altogether is at least over 200 hours long, give or take; the first 2 games are around 50 hours long each, with the third game being over 80 -- and again, this is without the numerous sidequests. And don't think about only playing one of them either; the entire trilogy tells one continuous story, so you can't just waltz into the second or third games without playing the previous installments, or else you might have a hard time understanding what's going on. The actual story isn't exactly orginal, (DEFEAT THE DARK LORD AND THE EVIL FORCES, RAH!!!), but aside from the dialogue at times, (forgiven since LF1&2 were earlier works, and the author's from a foreign nation,) the story's really rather well told, and the characters (the ones that are important to the story; there are over 50 that come and go to and from your large assemblage over the course of the story, so like Suikoden, only some of them are actually truly relvant to the actual story; some are even just optional, and not required at all,) are well developed. And battles are fast and fun as well. But again, it's very time consuming; not just due to the length, but the pacing. The story takes it's time, which means section of the game that might only take 10 minutes to cover in any other RPG could take at at least 3 times as long, and maybe then some. In other words, feel free to play it, but only if you have the time to do so. Otherwise, you might be at this for at least a year...

Secondly, I can understand the whole time management issue. I still have a decent amount of time on my hands, but even then, I still don't have as much time as I used to, at least enough to make me of aware what everyone else has pretty much been echoing in this thread. Even now, I'm not sure if I'd be as keen on playing the Laxius Force trilogy if I hadn't gone through it when I did.

Still, there is one Aldorea series some of you might be able to try if you haven't done so already; Millennium. If only because it's released in 15-20 hour installments. I personally don't like it as much as Laxius Force, (less skills, some of relevant characters arn't all that fleshed out,) but it's still good fun, and much easier on time-management schedules.